


The Winner

by ReasonablyUnreasonable



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Gen, Post-War, really don't know how to tag this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-06
Updated: 2014-12-06
Packaged: 2018-02-28 09:55:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 953
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2727983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReasonablyUnreasonable/pseuds/ReasonablyUnreasonable
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>All was not well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Winner

There was pain, and there were tears in every face, he remembered, after the final battle.

Everyone had lost someone, many someones. Some had lost themselves, too, to grief and agony and the all too appealing option of drowning in it.

And yet they had won, hadn't they?

Voldemort was dead.

Muggleborns and muggles wouldn't be in danger anymore, and Hermione could undo the memory charm on her parents. And maybe they could create a world where she wouldn't be a mudblood, or Ron a blood traitor for being with her. Maybe they could make something good out of this painful mess.

They had to. Otherwise there would be no point in their victory. Otherwise Harry had killed a man for nothing.

A very immoral man, admittedly, who'd done his damndest to ensure he wasn't a man anymore. But remained one nonetheless, much as he'd loathe to admit it, died like every other man nonetheless.

Someone who'd had the cruelty of the world shoved in his face from the first moment of life, someone who'd found solace in Hogwarts _(It's You-Know-Who we're talking about, right? Not you?)_  and who'd also wished to change the world, no matter how twisted his vision had been.

Someone he pitied deeply. Voldemort would have hated his pity, he knew. He couldn't muster enough respect for the man to care.

_(Could you possibly be feeling sorry for Lord Voldemort?)_

No. Possibly. Probably. Yes.

When he was twelve, he'd fiercely denied the similarities between himself and Tom Riddle, terrified of turning out like the other. Harry knew he wouldn't, now, and the similarities were more clear than ever.

_(There are strange likenesses between us, after all. Even you must have noticed.)_

He sympathized with Tom Riddle.

He pitied Lord Voldemort.

And it was why he knew that he could never, that he would never, turn out like him. Because he wouldn't allow all this pain, all these tears, all the deaths-  _Riddle's included_ \- to be for nothing.

He was Harry Potter.

_(The boy who has survived by accident, and because Dumbledore was pulling the strings-)_

He'd had the greatest Dark Lord of all times after him since age one, and he'd won. He was the Dark Lord's equal. He was the winner. And he'd be damned if he gave up now.

* * *

There was hope, and there were smiles in every face.

They were all fighting still, with him. Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Neville, Luna-  _friendsfriendsfriendsfamily_ \- everyone. And finally, maybe they were getting somewhere.

Blood purism ideas were not something you could just sternly lecture people about once and then they went away, but things were changing, and the change was almost palpable. There were stillthose who considered muggleborns an entirely different species, existing solely to be looked down on, and magical creatures were a far cry from equal to wizards, but- They were trying. And the results were showing.

Harry was happy.

Maybe things would never be fully well, he thought, but they were getting better than they used to be. Maybe the point wasn't in reaching perfection, but in always fighting so they would always continue to improve.

And yet the dreams remained, perhaps to remind him exactly what he was fighting for- as if he would  _ever_  forget. He wanted to call them nightmares, but couldn't.

He was there in his head every night, the eleven year old boy he'd seen in the pensieve, and then a helpless creature with red, burning eyes. But it was always cold in his dreams.

_(You can't help.)_

He woke shivering, and snuggled closer to Ginny- always warm, always comforting just by being there. The girl made an incoherent sound, somewhat between yawn and whine, twisting around to face him, and kissed his cheek.

"Tom, again?" she murmured.

"Yes," Harry admitted, and he knew he didn't have to make an excuse or say anything else.

"I dream of him too," she confessed quietly. "I dream of being the frigthened, insecure eleven year old me again. So far away from you, and from who I want to be. Then there's Tom, in all his cruel charm, listening to me. I'm not insignificant to him- or so I think at first, at least. I always think so at first."

She didn't need to make excuses, either. Perhaps he should be feeling jealous or even horrified that Ginny missed his dead enemy, but he understood. In a way, he did, too.

"Perhaps you weren't," he said. "And you weren't to me, either. You know that. You never were."

"Oh, I know." She sounded immensely pleased with the fact, and it made Harry's lips curl into a smile. "Just like you know you couldn't have saved him. But we'll never stop dreaming of him, I think."

Maybe he couldn't have. It didn't make it any better that he'd never even thought to try until it was too late.

He'd never asked to be the chosen one, he'd never asked for Voldemort to target him. He'd never asked to have to be the one to stop him. But he always knew he was going to. But it had always been his goal.

_(For many months now, my new target has been you.)_

Much like he had been Riddle's. Voldemort's, too.

And though things were not fully well, never would be, he had a new goal now.

His goal was every child like Harry Potter and Tom Riddle. He could still save  _them._ Make it so there wouldn't be more Dark Lord's or Boys-Who-Lived, and they could live happily with each other and their Ginnys.

He was the winner, not because he'd already won a fight, but because he would always continue fighting.

"No," he agreed. "We won't."

**Author's Note:**

> Er. This kind of just, happened. Moral lesson is, never leave me in a place without internet, or books. Terrible things happen.


End file.
